E6410 Owner's Thread

The power drain matches the battery capacity: 4.5 hours at 18W is 81Whr. To get more run time you have got to reduce the power consumption. For 6 hours you need to get down to an average of 13-14W.

(i) Take a look in Task Manager (processes tab) to see what is using the CPU. Flash, for example, can push up the web browser activity (I use Firefox with FlashBlock).
(ii) Reduce the display brightness.
(iii) Try other power management options while watching the power consumption.

I used to be able to get down below 10W with my Intel graphics E6410.

John

 

interesting info

 

Yes, this is the real problem: with previous installation I was able to run at about 12-13W in maximum power saving mode (light use, web surfing with wifi), now I can't

The next time I use laptop on battery for a long time will log battery drain and other acpi infos (cpu load, core power, gpu frequency, total power drain ...) with hwinfo and then plot them vs time.

 

You are probbaly missing a driver. Is Aero ON when on battery?
Try using Dell Extended battery life, AND have Aero ON (yes, ON, with transparency). Because, Aero uses the GPU to draw the interface, and it does like it's nothing, while for the CPU, despite using Aero Basic, it is "struggling" like no tomorrow... because it does something it was never designed to do.. draw (that is why we have GPU's). But I don't know about Intel solution. In my case, on my Latitude E6400, with Nvidia GPU, I save 30min when using Aero.

Also, check if your laptop fan is spinning (don't have it spin), in the power options, make sure cooling option is set to Passive, and not Active. When measuring for power, wait for the laptop to cool down and the fan stops.

 

I have an Intel 5300 AGN and it works well for me. There's no reason not to get an 802.11n adapter because they are so common now. I bought mine from eBay.

 

i get about 16-19w average with the same specs as your...my 6cell lasts 2.5-3hours max...i'm curious as to how you got it down so low.

ps..system is not even 3 months old

 

Monitoring acpi I've discovered that gpu frequency governor wasn't functioning properly. Each time I was doing something like restoring thunderbird windows, scroll down firefox web page or watching a youtube sd flash movie the gpu clock was rising at max frequency and came back to 135MHz after a long time of inactivity.

Reinstall dell 259.22 drivers did not change the gpu behaviour, but allowed me to use nv gpu pro: gpu's clock options were checked but grayed, I've enabled them and rebooted and now gpu stay at 135MHz for most of the time when on battery (on ac does the same thing as before) switching only when needed. Now total power drain is floating from 12.5 to 14W. I will try upgrading to nvidia 275.33 without doing a clean install, maybe modified settings will be conserved.

EDIT: PowerMizer Manager seems to have more useful options, I'll try with this settings on dell 259.22 and nvidia 275.33

 

Yea I need to update Nv GPU Pro.
I have just been very busy with a new software that will control the GPU speed using customizable profiles based what you run, using a customizable community updated game and software list. This software has 2 modes. Advance and Express. Express uses 2 generated profiles (minimum speed and normal speed, but those are editable in the options), gets the latest games and application list from the server, and use recommended setting for each of them based on what you run. And the advance mode, allows you to create unlimited profiles, and set which profile with which software. It also allows you to change system power plans based on weather your plugged-in or not, based on profiles, or programs.

This program is what helped me achieve ~10 hours (from ~9h) of battery life on my E6400. And on my desktop computer, reduce system noise, and allow me to have my GPU overclocked for certain games, and not have it overclocked all the time, consuming more power, making more noise, and heat, which is idiotic to have when you are just browsing folders in Windows or surfing the web.

In addition, to not fill up your system tray (tray next to the system clock), with more icons, it can show you your system battery life, and if the battery is charging or not, plugged-in or not, like Windows 7 icons, and looks the same.

The program looks as simple as this when running on the back:

(old screen shot, without battery notification)

I can update Nv GPU Pro software tonight actually.

 

I cannot understand why default nvidia drivers behaviour is the same on ac and battery. After manual tweaking (but leaving it in auto throttle mode) with nv gpu pro or powermizer manager the frequency gorvernor remain the same on ac and become more conservative in battery mode, like I suppose it was doing on my factory win 7 32 bit install.

PS: I noticed lower power drain disabling aero

 

Did you install the mobile (notebook) Nvidia drivers?
NVIDIA DRIVERS 275.33 WHQL

I think you installed the desktop one, that is why (yes, it works... but when I tried I get the same effect as you).